Canada Raises Taxes on Cigarettes
To Combat Smoking Among Youth

Dow Jones Newswires

Updated April 6, 2001 12:01 a.m. ET

OTTAWA -- Canada's federal government said it is immediately raising the taxes applied to cigarettes by four Canadian dollars (US$2.54) a carton in the provinces of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, Quebec and Ontario, where cigarette taxes were lowered a few years ago.

The government also said it will increase the federal excise tax on all cigarette cartons across Canada by C$1, and allocate an additional C$480 million over five years to beef up its antismoking campaign. A carton currently sells for about...